Classic British Flight Sim

For Nigel: Yes, the F111 did come with an auto installer. The previous day I had installed an earlier version of Steve Hess's panel for Mike Stone's F111C and all had worked well.

I spotted a newer version (Version 2) at simviation with improved graphics for the Mike Stone model which came bundled with a new cockpit all by Steven Hess, but was it he who had uploaded that bundle to simviation? Since the first panel from Steve Hess (Downloaded from a well known website not usually spoken about on this forum) I did not hesitate to use the self installer.

Now paying the price for that misjudgement!

For Dave B: I am astonished at how this has developed, never since 1995 had a problem like this. Can you please translate "AA" for me - I can only think of Alcoholics Anonymous(HIC, BURP, LOL)

I have just downloaded and installed the new Nvidia driver for my GT530. This new driver is 314.22. A quick attempt at using Fs9 ended with the 'black screen freeze' again.

I have never done a restore operation before and am somewhat dubious about attempting now since it seems to be aimed at my 'C' drive only. My operational FS9 is on my 'G' drive while the FS9.cfg is on the 'C' drive. Not quite sure how to proceed, I certainly do not want to re-install FS9 from scratch but that may prove to be the best course of action. Oh dear all that scenery and MAIW traffic!

Hiya James

AA is Anti-Alias. You either have this switched on or off in FS9.. no further adjustment can be made. However, your graphics driver (I see you have a GT530) should have a page where AA can be fine tuned.. increased or lowered depending on your taste and the possible speed trade off.. 2X, 4X 6X e t c. Putting this setting too high (not too high really but too high for FS9) can make the 'Select Aircraft' window (the spinning aircraft) be black. It's been too long now but I seem to remember my first nvidea 6000 series was the first card to show this bug, if it can be called that, and every nvidea card since has done it.

This however is not what you're seeing is it. You start the sim and get a black screen lockout. Are you able to switch between fullscreen and windowed mode before the lock happens?

When I mentioned repair, I wasn't talking about a 'restore'.. as in a system restore. If you put the FS9 disc 1 in, I think it comes up with 3 options.. install, repair and remove. Repair will reload all the sim 'vital' files but as I mentioned before.. I doubt whether it would take into consideration the 9.1 update. Whether you could uninstall the 9.1 update, run 'repair' then re-install the 9.1 update and expect everything to work.. I'd not be sure. It'd be a risk taker. That said.. other options are getting few.

ATB
DaveB

Thanks Dave. Will try 'repair' tomorrow after looking at "AA". Thank you very much for your help. Your idea about 9.1 is certainly worth trying. I shall be in touch.

The nightmare continues.

I have tried FS9 disk 1 but was unable to find 'Repair': only "Installation."

Attempted to "Restore" computer on one date but computer shut down automatically to prevent damage some minutes into the restore process. Managed to get back to my restore starting point and tried again - no go but suddenly a "Repair" screen appeared. When activated the "Repair" screen got down to it but eventually indicated that the auto repair system was unable to cope and requested that information be sent to MS. Done.

I then chose to restart my computer and attempt another try to "Restore" using a different date. That attempt also failed and also produced the 'shut down to prevent damage'. The computer is now in the state that it was when I switched off last evening. FS9 not working but other programs seem to be OK and after resetting my Modem access to the Internet is Ok.

Will ask local guru to call next week - most inconvenient that this should happen during a public holiday.

Happy Easter everyone!!

Hi James

Sri to hear you've got no further. I guess the 'repair' facility must be with FSX.. not FS9

It pains me to say it but as the pc won't restore.. this is indicative of something more fundamental wrong. Try locating DXDIAG and running that to see if something pop's up. I have to say that it's never produced anything meaningful for me but there's always a first time.

Hope you have a good Easter anyway

ATB
DaveB

Hi Dave

Tried DXDIAG - no problems found in any of the parts of my system! TVM.

Is it possible that it could be a DLL.XML problem?

The local guru came round today to check out my computer and after a thorough examination it appears that all the dlls that should be there are present, some of my FS9 dlls might be like Mrecombe And Wise "playing all the right notes but not in the right order."

My OS (W7.1) has been thoroughly checked so the only course of action is to completely re-install Fs9 from the start.

Looking at all the comments on various Forums it would appear advisable to make the new installation outside the G/Programs section which, it has been written, has a beefed up security routine written by MS to stop the programs therein being altered by addons. So the new installation will be made on something like G/FS94/MSGames/FS9.

The business of installing outside the normal "programs" may be a bit of a myth but my problems began immediately after a large Windows update plus using an acft with a self installing program.

I shall copy many of my current scenery, texture, addon scenery files and replace the those in the new "vanilla" FS9 installation.

Well I hope to have a new working system by this time next week because real life events are going to break up the slog - thank goodness.

Hiya James

I think it's been 'good practise' to install outside the MS default for a long time but there's something about Vista/Win7 and very probably Win8 that makes it even more important.. not least of all for the reason you've mentioned. I always choose a nice simple name for my installs be it FS9 or FSX.. E:\Flight Simulator 9 and F:\Flight Simulator X. No need to make it more complicated than necessary by putting in a 'Games' folder unless you're dead against it not being in one.

ATB
DaveB